Frustration over the failure of the US-mediated Middle East summit had President Bill Clinton venting Sunday about the thorny issue of the status of Jerusalem, which has been holding up the pact he so hopes to clinch.
"It is a holy city, but it has caused a hellish lot of problems," Clinton told members of the Jewish lobby group, the American-Israel Public Affairs Committee.
"It's kind of like going to the dentist without anybody to deaden your gums," said Clinton, who mediated in the Camp David summit last month.
The status of Jerusalem was the deal-breaker in the meetings between Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak and Palestinian President Yasser Arafat at the presidential retreat, where Clinton hoped to broker an agreement that would boost his legacy.
The president, who leaves office in January, was blunt about his disappointment.
"I don't want to sugarcoat it. I wanted an agreement and we didn't get one, but I can tell you we made a lot of progress," he said.
Clinton has implicitly laid the lion's share of the blame on Arafat, and he has heaped praise on Barak for taking political risks to win an agreement.
He echoed those sentiments Sunday, saying: "In the meantime we will continue to stand with Israel, as we have throughout my tenure." -- LOS ANGELES (AFP)
© 2000 Al Bawaba (www.albawaba.com)
